Outdated paper is ripe for retirement

Paper costs businesses money. That's the message of the recently launched Paper-Less Alliance, an initiative founded by Jon Dee, founder of not-for-profit Do Something.

"Paper was invented thousands of years ago. It's an out of date technology for most of today's business processes," said Dee, who also founded the consumer-focused Planet Ark 19 years ago.

The Alliance is lobbying businesses to move to electronic document management by focussing on the many business benefits that come from reducing paper. The first task is raising awareness of the amount of paper produced in business, which averages 10,000 pages per officeworker a year, according to the Alliance.

"There are still people out there who insist on printing every email. If they're aware of that, then they'll change," said Dee.

The Alliance's website carries case studies of companies which have moved to electronic document management, including finance like ANZ and AMP.

There are also videos, tips, articles and a blog by Dee. Campaign tools include a free application called Paper-Less Pro which sits on the desktop and calculates paper pages printed and displays it as numbers of trees cut down, carbon produced and energy consumed.

"We all want the paperless office but this is more pragmatic," said Chris, owner of independent software developer Papercut, which wrote the application.

The primary cost of buying paper is a tiny part of the outlay required to manage a paper-based office. A cost is attached to every piece of paper that is printed, posted, packed, copied, stored, disposed of or recycled.

Secondary costs include bottlenecks in management, delays in paper-based (ie cheques) orders and payments, increased administration and employment costs to handle paper and increased rental space and infrastructure for the housing and storage of paper, said the Alliance.

Moving to an electronic document system reduces these costs and brings several benefits. The first is storage - one 500GB drive can hold 17 million pages, which would otherwise require 2100 filing cabinets.

Other bonuses include greater control of document security, ease of use, greater productivity, never losing documents, and the ability to search and share documents easily, said the Alliance.

People make less mistakes filling in electronic forms than paper forms, which often reintroduce more mistakes during their re-typing.

Electronic collaboration can happen instantly anywhere someone has an internet connection. Paper-based collaboration requires access to the physical documents, a copier or a fax machine.

Dee explained that the name of the alliance recognised that a completely paperless office was an unachievable aim. Hence the aim to have a less paper office.